Guardsman’s wife has her own battles on home front

Wife deals with family emergencies while her husband is serving in Iraq

Misty McCormick’s basement flooded. Her baby knocked his head at day care and needed 36 stitches. A Dora the Explorer doll trekked down the toilet and clogged the drain. The roof is leaking. And McCormick’s husband is 7,000 miles away.

“Can anything else go wrong?” said McCormick, 24. “I’m just the bad luck person.”

McCormick’s husband, Kurtis McCormick, is in the Kansas Army National Guard. He departed for Iraq in March. He won’t return until January at the earliest. Meanwhile, the Eudora mother of Kasi, 4, and Kurtis, 14 months, is battling a case of Murphy’s Law: If anything can go wrong, it will.

“Every time I look at her, I think, ‘If one more thing happens, she’s going to go off the deep end,'” said Robyn Johnstone, Misty McCormick’s mother.

The trouble started June 1 when McCormick’s sump pump died. Her basement flooded with 2 inches of water.

The basement was a storage spot for many family keepsakes, books, letters, Christmas ornaments, knickknacks and old records.

Misty McCormick, right, checks out groceries for Stephanie Shipe, left, as Tony Hickman, center left, and Charles Freeman wait in line at C & S Market, 1402 Church St., in Eudora. McCormick's basement was flooded when her sump pump quit. Then her roof started to leak in the bedroom of her son, who suffered a fall requiring 36 stitches. McCormick's husband has been serving in Iraq in the Kansas Army National Guard since January, leaving her to deal with the problems herself.

McCormick’s husband is building roads in Iraq. They used to talk nearly every day, but lately he’s been too busy to call. He sends letters and cards. When McCormick’s basement flooded, she sent off a letter to her husband asking him how to clean it up. She couldn’t wait for a reply.

The cleanup took days. McCormick had to take off work and called on family for help. They ripped up the basement carpet and scoured the floors.

Some things were salvaged. An old yearbook, laid out and blown with a fan, is expected to have a full recovery.

The odor of wet carpet and Lysol lingers. Combined, they give off a pungent scent, like chewing tobacco.

Last weekend, she spotted water in her son’s room. She traced it to the roof, which was leaking.

McCormick took the mess with a sense of duty. But there was more in store for her.

Then, on Tuesday, McCormick’s son, 14-month-old Kurtis, hit his head on the jungle gym at day care.

McCormick got the call at work: Her son was going to the emergency room.

It couldn’t be, McCormick thought. But when she heard her son’s crying in the background, she headed to the hospital.

Kurtis McCormick has been serving with the Kansas Army National Guard in Iraq, leaving his wife, Misty, and two children, Kasi, 4, and Kurtis, 14 months, alone in Eudora.

A plastic surgeon’s help and 36 stitches later, little Kurtis left the hospital.

On another day he picked up his trusty friend Dora The Explorer and sent her swimming down the toilet. Dora The Explorer is a character on Nickelodeon who often goes on journeys with her animal friends.

No one knew of Dora’s adventure until a plumber, the same one who helped with the sump pump, sent a camera down the pipe. He spotted her and Dora was flushed away.

And that, McCormick hopes, is the end.

Her husband’s the handy one. He works for a guttering company in the Kansas City area.

Without him, she feels like a single mother.

“It’s hard,” she said. “I didn’t realize how easy I had it when he was home.”

She misses her husband, but she also understands the commitments he has made.

McCormick is not alone.

“There’s a time when you have to go in and do your federal mission,” said Joy Moser, director of public affairs for the Kansas Army National Guard. “That means that family members will have to sacrifice. They won’t have that individual there on a daily basis. They’ll have to learn new skills and adjust in many ways.”

McCormick wishes she could share her ordeal with her husband.

“I just wish he was here to see it all,” McCormick said. “I just wish that he was home.”